Born Free (1966) - 12/8/15 Limited Edition from Twilight Time

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A classic makes its way to Blu-ray on December 8, 2015, courtesy of Twilight Time.

From Rotten Tomatoes film summary: Based on Joy Adamson's book, this moving docudrama tells the story of how Joy and her game-warden husband George raised an orphaned lion cub as their own. Unwilling to send their beloved lioness Elsa to a zoo, they decide to teach her how to hunt and survive in the wild.

Trailer

MOVIE TRAILER -- "BORN FREE" (1966) - YouTube

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Born Free is one of the most famous films to come out the 1960s. Based on Joy Adamson's book about her and her husband's life in Africa, it is the story of raising three orphaned lion cubs (one of which is the famous Elsa the Lioness) after their mother is killed in self-defense by George Adamson. The title song by John Barry is one of the most iconic in film history. Born Free was like a childhood rite of passage for me, having been exposed to it in grade school about 1970 a few years after its release. The book, the movie, and John Barry's score stayed with me for years.

Born Free is a marvelous film, folks. The Adamsons raise the lion cubs essentially as pets, yet as they grow the couple realizes decisions must be made about their future. Joy has grown especially attached to Elsa, the smartest of the three. How the Adamsons deal with their decisions, and what to do about potentially releasing tame lions into the wild, is the core of the story. Admittedly, Born Free consciously tugs at the heartstrings of its audience, but it is so much more than sentiment. It is a well done, beautiful, and sensitively portrayed tale that will awaken the sense of childhood wonder and imagination in all who see it.

[filmmusic]

It would be great if this had a 4K scan, but I doubt it.

[Thomas Irwin]

An awesome film. I haven't seen this one in many years. I'm looking forward to it. I'm just glad they didn't play the theme song in the trailer or I'd have that stuck in my head all day.

[Twilight Time]

Originally Posted by filmmusic

It would be great if this had a 4K scan, but I doubt it.

According to our contacts at Sony, this is one of the most expensive and time-consuming restorations they have recently undertaken. 4K all the way.

[thismightbezach]

This and Roar will make a good double feature

[Musicguy]

Originally Posted by Twilight Time

According to our contacts at Sony, this is one of the most expensive and time-consuming restorations they have recently undertaken. 4K all the way.

It's a beautiful looking film to begin with, this should look great on Blu-ray

[drak b]

I'm stunned/delighted that this one is making its way to Blu-ray! Very unexpected and very eagerly anticipated!

[javi92]

Originally Posted by thismightbezach

This and Roar will make a good double feature

Was going to say the exact same thing

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Pre-orders begin FRIDAY, November 20 @ 4pm EST

Special Features: Isolated Score Track / Audio Commentary with Film Historians Jon Burlingame, Julie Kirgo, and Nick Redman / Original Theatrical Trailers

[in2video2]

One of my fondest childhood memories was seeing Born Free in its first release. It has always lived with me. A fantastic realization on film from a best-selling novel, something that rarely happens. Day One purchase!

[filmmusic]

I hope this is not expected to be OOP in a month or so.

[obscurelabel]

Would've been nice to see an interview or commentary from the delightful star Virginia McKenna, who is still alive and (I hope) well at age 84.

[McCrutchy]

Uh, is the audio on this lossless? Because it looks like all three tracks are lossy 768 kbps DTS.

http://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d1=7347&d2=7348

Hopefully, something is wrong?

[Twilight Time]

Originally Posted by McCrutchy

Uh, is the audio on this lossless? Because it looks like all three tracks are lossy 768 kbps DTS.

http://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d1=7347&d2=7348

Hopefully, something is wrong?

All audio tracks are DTS-HD MA - as on every TT release.

[McCrutchy]

Originally Posted by Twilight Time

All audio tracks are DTS-HD MA - as on every TT release.

Sure, but is it possible that there was an authoring error on this title that affects some discs?

I know you might not be familiar with the BDInfo application, TT, so as an example, here is the BDInfo scan for one of your other titles, which I know has DTS-HD MA (because i own it ):

http://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d1=3820&d2=3821

In this case, you can see the tracks are all "DTS-HD Master Audio", and they are, of course, larger in size than a 768 kbps DTS track.

All that program does is read what has been encoded onto a particular Blu-ray Disc and spit it out as a text file, and it appears to be saying that caps-a-holic's disc of Born Free has only DTS, so that's why I am concerned.